The Power of Suggestion

The power of suggestion is everywhere. It's almost a part of human nature. So my guess is, you landed here to find out what's in it for you.

A lot.

Knowing that you are susceptible to getting the swine flu by exposing yourself to someone who has it, gives you the power of choice to take whatever action is necessary to protect yourself. This puts you in control of your actions, that get you the things YOU want. Or, in this case, what you do not want.

Knowing you are susceptible to making choices, by exposing your mind to what others want you to think, puts you in control too.

For example, take a class of students. They're going over the answers to their tests with the teacher.

She calls on one student, "Tom, what's the answer to #3?" and Tom replies, "A". So, then maybe the teacher turns to another student and asks the same question to Jim. Let's say Jim thinks the answer was "B" , however, Jim gives the same answer "A" because Tom did.

And I'm sure you know this is called...peer pressure.

The statistics say that something like 65% of us will give the wrong answer just because we heard someone else say it, even if we know it's the wrong answer.

Studies done by social researcher Soloman Asch validate this.

In his experiments, subjects were placed in a classroom setting and given content that they later were quizzed on.

The questions were very easy to answer correctly, students in previous tests reached a 98% accuracy. So in this class, they were placed with 6-9 peer groups to discuss the answers in a group format.

The subjects were not told there were confederate peers who purposely stated their wrong answers to the group.

Believe it or not, after hearing the peers all give the wrong answer, the subjects gave the wrong answer agreeing with the group think. Yep they did...can you remember a time when maybe you did? I can, hate to admit it but yes, me too. That was long ago before I learned how to ALWAYS think for myself...

The power of suggestion is very strong.

Asch used 7- 12 clinical trials and used these experiments to validate his findings, that in fact, people have a very strong inclination to conform to peer group standards even when they know they are wrong. So our minds are very susceptible to all sorts of untruths and misconceptions.

The dynamic potentials of the human mind are endless. How far we can take this information is inconceivable to us at this point.

Another great example of the power of suggestion is the placebo effect.

Why the placebo effect works, is still being researched by scientists.

Many hypnotherapists have known about how powerful it's effects can be and have used the power of suggestion to help people for years. It has just taken the academics a while, to fund, and conduct measurable experiments to prove the validity of these concepts.

The overall conclusion is that there is considerable power in suggestion.